MUMBAI: CNN will on three consecutive days beginning 30 December offer a look back at 2006; from the stories that dominated the news agenda and an in-depth review of how CNN reported these stories in its award winning style. Defining Moments 2006 uses comment and analysis from CNN’s international correspondents to reflect and go behind the stories that as the year draws to a close made 2006 such a memorable one.

Conflict shaped much of 2006, and Defining Moments charts the increasing tensions in the Middle East, especially in Lebanon and Iraq. The abduction of two Israeli soldiers as broken by CNN’s Anthony Mills on July 12th marked the beginning of round the clock coverage of the Israel-Hezbollah war that dominated global news for a month.

The special looks back at the events that took place from within Israel and Lebanon as well as the countries connected to the conflict during that volatile time. CNN also documents the 7/11 Mumbai train bombings which killed nearly 200 innocent people, features spiralling violence between Sunnis and Shiias in Iraq, witnessed through the eyes of CNN correspondents on the ground in Baghdad and across the Iraqi nation.

From insurgents and rocket attacks to the nuclear club with two potentially new members; 2006 saw CNN’s Dan Rivers reporting live from a tense Korean border. The programme relives the unfolding of both North Korea and Iran’s nuclear ambitions as reported throughout the year.

On a lighter note, 2006 is also remembered for such stories as the delisting of Pluto as one of our planets, the football World Cup, more dope than cycling at the Tour de France and the bowing out of the internationally loved Andre Agassi from the tennis circuit. The special revisits these stories and shares the highs, and lows, that characterised 2006.